Interview: Jonah Hill Talks On-Set Film School With Martin Scorsese, The Reality Of ‘Wolf Of Wall Street’ & More

By
Charlie Schmidlin
|
The PlaylistJanuary 7, 2014 at 12:01PM

The infectious insanity of Martin Scorsese’s “The Wolf of Wall Street” continues to spread, as audiences settle down for their first viewing of the 3-hour, NC-17-skirting film starring Leonardo DiCaprio, or perhaps a second or third after a horribly misguided Christmas outing with the family. We called it “ a wild, potent ride” in our review, and from hearing actor Jonah Hill speak about his experience on the film—playing Jordan Belfort’s right-hand man Donnie Azoff—it’s clear that the “Moneyball” actor was feeling the same vibes throughout the entire shoot.

The infectious insanity of Martin Scorsese’s “The Wolf of Wall Street” continues to spread, as audiences settle down for their first viewing of the 3-hour, NC-17-skirting film starring Leonardo DiCaprio, or perhaps a second or third after a horribly misguided Christmas outing with the family. We called it “ a wild, potent ride” in our review, and from hearing actor Jonah Hill speak about his experience on the film—playing Jordan Belfort’s right-hand man Donnie Azoff—it’s clear that the “Moneyball” actor was feeling the same vibes throughout the entire shoot.

Mainly a character sketch of Wall Street exec Danny Porush, Azoff as played by Hill is a confidently deranged slice of WASPy energy. In fact though, Hill—a lifelong Scorsese fan—was terrified coming into the fold with one of his favorite directors. During a recent roundtable discussion in Los Angeles, he pointed to “three or four weeks” elapsing before he thought he wasn’t actually going to get fired, “because they've probably shot enough to not want to reshoot all that stuff with somebody else. And for more with the actor on his unique “Wolf” experience, dive in below.

"I can't speak for anyone else, but I wouldn't want to actually be friends with these people."

On What Hill Took Away From Working With ScorseseJonah Hill: It exceeded my expectations, and my expectations couldn't have been higher. As far as what I've learned, what I was able to do with Donnie doesn't come along often in people's careers—to be that unhinged, messed up, fractured and out of control. I think what Scorsese does better than anybody else is he creates organized chaos. He creates a safe and organized place for people to become completely unhinged, and I don't know how he does that.

On Witnessing Scorsese’s Encyclopedic Film Knowledge
Every part of working with him was so amazing, but I remember one day he asked me, "Have you ever seen Elaine May's 'A New Leaf?' " I said no, and then the next day someone handed me a copy of the film. That would happen often—you'd watch a film and then have to be able to talk about it, and that was amazing for him to do that for me. It was just a cool, amazing bonus to not only be working with your hero and learning from him about what you're working on, but also being able to have a dialogue about things. I love film more than anything, other than personal relationships, but the fact that you can learn from your hero, who knows more about the history of film than pretty much anyone in the world and why things are important—it's just amazing.

Hill Also Managed To Indulge With Scorsese About The Director’s Filmography
I think he knows people really look up to him, and not in an egotistic way at all. "Goodfellas" is one of my favorite films, and we'd just be sitting around in between takes and he would mostly start talking about "Goodfellas" or "Taxi Driver" or something organically if there was something that reminded him of them. And then I would just launch into questions, because he had started it. So it was like once he opened the door, I was like, "Okay, what about this? And what was this like?" It was amazing. Rob Reiner was there a lot, which was great, and one day by circumstance I got to sit in a room and hang out for an hour and a half with Robbie Robertson from The Band and Scorsese and Rob Reiner. It was one of the greatest days ever that I got to sit near these guys and talk about their work. Steven Spielberg came one day while we were working and sat behind the monitors and we would go get notes. It was just the most surreal, amazing thing you could ever imagine.

Realizing The Reality of Jordan Belfort’s Book Intrigued Hill The Most
I read the book a few times when I found out I was in contention for the part. I couldn't put the book down, and I couldn't believe this was actually how people behaved with other people. That's what makes the movie a story worth telling, is that this is what these people did, and this is how they got punished for it. And the most interesting part is that they get a slap on the wrist and they're okay. That's what's really shocking to me.

Donny is pretty hard to like. I found him entertaining. You know, if you were at a party with this person you might talk to him. But he's really more obnoxious than anything else. I had a harder time with that. I can't speak for anyone else, but I wouldn't want to actually be friends with these people. I found them entertaining to watch. I find lots of characters in movies entertaining to watch that I wouldn't necessarily want to spend my time with.